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Free Will Astrology

ARIES (March 21-April 19)

I’m not a big fan of fear. It gets far more attention than it deserves. The media and entertainment industries practically worship it, and many of us allow ourselves to be riddled with toxic amounts of the stuff. Having said that, though, I do want to put in a good word for fear. Now and then, it keeps us from doing stupid things. It prods us to be wiser and act with more integrity. It forces us to see the truth when we might prefer to wallow in delusion. Now is one of those times for you, Aries. Thank your fear for helping to wake you up.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20)

“Poetry might be defined as the clear expression of mixed feelings,” wrote W.H. Auden. If that’s true, then your job is to be a poet right now. You seem to be awash in a hubbub of paradoxical inclinations, complete with conflicting desires and mismatched truths. There’s no shame or blame in that. But you do have a responsibility to communicate your complexity with honesty and precision. If you can manage that, people will treat you with affection and give you extra slack. They might even thank you.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20)

What can you do to improve your flow? Are there obstructions in your environment that keep you from having a more fluidic rhythm? Do you harbor negative beliefs that make it harder for life to bestow its natural blessings on you? Now is the time to take care of glitches like these, Gemini. You have more power than usual to eliminate constrictions and dissolve fixations. Your intuition will be strong when you use it to drum up graceful luck for your personal use. Be aggressive. Be bold. Be lyrical. It’s high time for you to slip into a smooth groove.

CANCER (June 21-July 22)

In the beginning of his novel *The White Castle,* Orhan Pamuk offers this meditation: “To imagine that a person who intrigues us has access to a way of life unknown and all the more attractive for its mystery, to believe that we will begin to live only through the love of that person—what else is this but the birth of great passion?” How do you respond to this provocative statement, Cancerian? Here are my thoughts: On the one hand, maybe it’s not healthy for you to fantasize that a special someone can give you what you can’t give yourself. On the other hand, believing this is true may inspire you to take an intriguing risk that would catalyze invigorating transformations. Which is it? Now is a good time to ruminate on these matters.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22)

Canadians Tommy Larkin and Stephen Goosney are biological brothers, but they were adopted by different families when they were young. They lost touch for almost 30 years. Once they began looking for each other, it didn’t take long to be reunited. Nor did they have to travel far to celebrate. It turns out that they were living across the street from each other in the same small town in Newfoundland. I foresee a metaphorically similar experience in your future, Leo. When you get reconnected to your past, you will find that it has been closer than you realized.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22)

This will be an excellent week for you to talk with yourself — or rather, with yourselves. I’m envisioning in-depth conversations between your inner saint and your inner evil twin . . . between the hard worker and the lover of creature comforts . . . between the eager-to-please servant of the greater good and the self-sufficient smartie who’s dedicated to personal success. I think that in at least some of these confabs, you should speak every word out loud. You should gesture with your hands and express colorful body language. It’s prime time for your different sub-personalities to get to know each other better.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22)

In the coming week you will probably have more luck than usual if you play keno, craps, blackjack, bingo, or roulette. People who owe you money will be inclined to pay you back, so you might want to give them a nudge. I won’t be surprised if you find a $20 bill lying on the sidewalk or if a store cashier accidentally gives you way too much change. In the wake of these tendencies, your main assignment is to be alert for opportunities to increase your cash flow. For example, if you wake up in the middle of the night with an idea for boosting your financial fortunes, I hope you will have a pen and notebook by the bed to write it down.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21)

“Not for all the whiskey in heaven,” begins a poem by Charles Bernstein. “Not for all the flies in Vermont. Not for all the tears in the basement. Not for a million trips to Mars. Not for all the fire in hell. Not for all the blue in the sky.” Can you guess what he’s driving at? Those are the things he will gladly do without in order to serve his passion. “No, never, I’ll never stop loving you,” he concludes. According to my understanding of your astrological cycle, Scorpio, now is a good time for you to make a comparable pledge. What is the one passion you promise to devote yourself to above all others? And what are you willing to live without in order to focus on that passion? Be extravagant, pure, wild, and explicit.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21)

Dmitri Razumikhin is a character in Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novel *Crime and Punishment.* His surname is derived from the Russian word for “reason.” At one point he makes a drunken speech that includes these observations: “It’s by talking nonsense that one gets to the truth! Not one single truth has ever been arrived at without people first having talked a dozen reams of nonsense, even ten dozen reams of it.” Let’s make this a centerpiece of your current strategy, Sagittarius. Just assume that in order to ferret out the core insights that will fuel your next transformations, you may need to speak and hear a lot of babble.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19)

At the 2013 Grammy Awards, actor Neil Patrick Harris introduced the band Fun this way: “As legendary gangster rap icon Katharine Hepburn once said, if you follow all the rules, you miss all the fun.” Everything about that vignette is a template for the approach you can use now with great success. You should gravitate toward festive events and convivial gatherings. Whenever possible, you should sponsor, activate, and pave the way for fun. Toward that end, it’s totally permissible for you to tell amusing stories that aren’t exactly factual and that bend the rules not quite to the breaking point.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18)

Some spiritual traditions regard the ego as a bad thing. They imply it’s the source of suffering — a chronically infected pustule that must be regularly lanced and drained. I understand this argument. The ego has probably been the single most destructive force in the history of civilization. But I also think it’s our sacred duty to redeem and rehabilitate it. After all, we often need our egos in order to get important things done. Our egos give us the confidence to push through difficulties. They motivate us to work hard to achieve our dreams. Your assignment, Aquarius, is to beautify your ego as you strengthen it. Build your self-esteem without stirring up arrogance. Love yourself brilliantly, not neurotically. Express your talents in ways that stimulate others to express their talents.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20)

Dr. Seuss wrote his children’s books in English, but he liked to stretch the limits of his native tongue. “You’ll be surprised what there is to be found once you go beyond ‘Z’ and start poking around,” he said. One of the extra letters he found out there was “yuzz,” which he used to spell the made-up word “yuzz-a-ma-tuzz.” I recommend that you take after Seuss — not only in the way you speak, but also in the ways you work, play, love, dream, and seek adventure. It’s time to explore the territory beyond your comfort zone.